INTRO

Compelling genetics marred by numerous compromises.  Squid Pants here checking out Mtl Cannabis’ version of Cookies N’ Cream.

Cookies N’ Cream

Cookies N’ Cream (in Quebec sold as Cookies N’ Crème) was originally bred by Exotic Genetics and is Startfighter X Girl Scout Cookies.  My familiarity with and affection for this cultivar is from the homegrown community and this will be my first look at a commercially produced version.

Mtl

Mtl Cannabis is a Quebec based grower who describe themselves with an avalanche of buzzwords.  If there’s a compelling story involved with the founding or development of this company they can’t seem to be bothered telling us and instead just pack in marketing phrases and the like, so, let’s just move on.

Packaging

Oversized black plastic bin.  This is possibly my least favourite form of packaging in the legal market.  Black plastic is not recyclable everywhere in Canada, check local rules.  The plastics used to make these allow water to diffuse through the walls so cannabis can easily dry out completely during storage.  Also, being oversized means there’s more plastic than needed in its construction.  Finally the buds get easily knocked around inside breaking trichome heads off that then stick to the sides of the bin due to static charges.

Looks

On the good side buds are a uniform khaki with respectable coverage, otherwise multiple issues exist.  The bud structure is loose and larfy with gaps between the bracts themselves.  A huge amount of leaf is present due to a highly deficient trim.  At several points it looks like the leaf blades were trimmed off but in a way that leaves the entire petiole behind, because larf with pointy sticks projecting out is what the consumer wants I guess.

Feel

Under compression the buds crack, crumble and turn to dust.  This cannabis embodies the very concept of dryness itself.  This couldn’t be worse.

Scent

Louder than one would assume considering all the issues, the first and continuing dominant scent was lemonade from the Starfighter side of the family, with milder scent contributions from the Cookie’s side.  Grinding amplifies the typical Cookie notes nicely and brings out black pepper scents.

Taste

Volcano:  Taste is an earthy cookie with lemonade following, the latter of which lingers in the aftertaste.  Floral notes border on soapy.  Dries down to earthy vegetable notes.  Honestly not bad, just too muted.

Joint:  Every part of this process was miserable and gross.  In a word; don’t.

Price and Value

This cannabis was bought from Green Merchant in the Annex neighbourhood in Toronto where I paid $34.81 before tax and after a 15% discount.  This means before tax I paid $9.95 per gram.  Price per 100mg of THC is $3.85.

There’s 8.5 mg/g of CBG in there, a cannabinoid with almost no clinical research and few animal model or in vitro studies performed on it so interesting but unclear if it’ll have an impact on your consumption experience.  Terpenes are labelled cringingly as “Terps” and are listed as 2.95% of the contents (a breakdown of these are visible in the accompanying photos).  Of course this tells you only a bit of the story of the actual tastes and scents you will experience since it ignores every other class of volatiles, but if your purchase decisions are influenced by this that’s a respectable percentage.  Just remember to take that number with a grain of salt since a low terpene percentage doesn’t per se map one to one to low scent and taste nor is the opposite true per se.

This was packaged on January 3rd, 2022 and I opened it for this review 40 days later.

Looking past the numbers, bluntly I failed to find value here and cannot recommend this.  There are innumerable offerings in this price category that offer far greater quality and value.

Conclusions

Potential is there, but I should mention I tried a bud of Mtl’s Sage N’ Sour a friend gave me a ways back and except for scent and taste a review would look almost the same.  The growers have great taste in genetics but have a long way to go in every other domain before they reach acceptable quality.  That said I hesitate to write them off and hope they address the shortcomings seen here in the near future.